Ordered mine off Amazon and have it paid for already after selling stuff via Amazon trade and an old iphone - the balance is now £0.00 think i'll be able to afford that even 11 days before christmas, which is not logical as it's a very tight month (for the western world).

There's absolutely zero chance it will be December. They're not going to let Microsoft beat them to market by several weeks and launch just a couple of weeks before Christmas. That'd be absolutely ridiculous.

December is too late, they are aiming for the Christmas present market. They'll be keeping an eye on MS too. "Holiday" for America means sometime in November - they don't start all the Christmas shite in August like we do.